Friday, June 4, 2010

At the outset i would like to first thank my blogdost Karthik of http://www.wildwanderer.com/journal/ who has been instrumental in searching out Agast for me, the fritters of which i ate when i was a small baby in Arrah. He also informs me that this is also known as Bak Ful in Bengali.

So in my post http://shivanidiwani64.blogspot.com/2010/05/kacchi-kali-kachnaar-ki.html which had the hazy memory of this white flower is not Kachnaar. Although Kachnaar is also used to make fritters it is this flower that i knew as Agast. Before anything i have to express my thrill at this discovery and i can truly say that today is one Eureka moment for me.Also that i am indebted to this blogdost for bringing to my notice this flower of my childhood which i was supposing to be Kachnaar.

i feel happy and reassured that once again my belief that if you want something very badly something pushes youtowards it has helped me to find what i was looking for. i guess then it was okay on my part not to ask my Dad if Agast was Kachnaar because Agast is Agst and not Kachnaar as i was supposing it to be.

i am on my path of discovery and i believe this way my search was not an exercise in futility.i was helped in my effort though from someone i met through my blogs and this makes me more than happy.Now at last i can ask for this wonderful tree by it's local name and probably will be able to find it too.

But funny how suddenly at this juncture i seem to be delving more and more into memories and want some from the yesteryears back in my life. More than anything the simplicity and the freshness of everything.
i seem to be getting perturbed by some unknown fear of many species slowly getting extinct. For,
"They took all the trees
And put them in a tree museum
And they charged all the people
A dollar and a half just to see 'em
Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
Till it's all gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot."Joni Mitchell, Big Yellow Taxi
( listen to her sing this song at the end of the post)

Maybe that's one reason why i feel so overjoyed at finding Agastiya which is the Sanskrit for this locally named Agst.Relieved to know that it is yet there and still is providing humanity with food,fodder and medicines.

Now as i know that it is known commonly as the Humming Bird Tree i wonder why it has been named so.Is it because of its unique structure that makes it easy for the Humming bird to dip it's beak inside to sip nectar or does it resemble the dainty , extremely beautiful and very small bird itself ? i shall soon find out. Cause i am on that road called DISCOVERY.

''It is not so much for it's beauty that the forest makes a claim upon men's hearts,as for that subtle something,that quality of air that emanates from old trees, that so wonderfully changes and renews a weary heart"Robert Louis Stevenson

"I lie here and learn

How,over their ground,

Trees make a long shadow

And a light sound.''

Louise Bogan (1898-1970)

(Modern American poet)

Maybe i can find this tree and the seed which i can plant where i shall have my permanent residence. Probably that should be my effort to link the past and the future.
This should be my resolution today as filled with joy at finding my Agst i can think of nothing else. And i seriously hope that i prove Oscar Wilde wrong in what he said about good resolutions.
''Good resolutions are simply checks that men draw on a bank when they have no account"

Wasn't it Khalil Gibran who said,"If you reveal your secrets to the wind you should not blame the wind for revealing them to the trees."

Maybe i did not find the tree rather the tree of my childhood 'neath which i played house house and the flowers of which i ate with relish as Bachka (fritters) found me. Tonight i sleep well and so happy with this chance meeting. Iske siva kuch yaad nahin...iske siva kuch baat nahin....Agst mein main hui hui hui hui ... mast! hey yay yay... mast...mast... main mast...
(Excepting this i do not remember anything...excepting this there is no talk... i am feeling cool...super...awesome in knowing Agast)

12 comments:

Loved the post at so many levels. Bakful is awesome. Cannot even recall when was the last time I crunched into one. You brought back memories ...so tasty. Yellow Taxi. Wow. A song I have not heard in so long. All the Biology pictures (so shallow of me) you have look nice. I just "read between the pictures" ...nice quotes. But can in no way imagine Urmila dancing to those words ... :)

@Le embrouille Thank you tremendously for following me in my journey that led to my discovery of this long lost flower and the tree.It feels gr8 to see ur comment and that u found it 'so tasty' too.Yeah Yellow Taxi was the first one i heard which talks about the human settlements destroying nature.Hmmm! Urmila and her gyrations do not fit into the post,NO Way although i fit in the song as i was Mast and my heart sang it to compose a silly parody.:)

@Aakaash oh Sonna thanks a ton...and it was you who had used that comment once...u won't remember...it was about the New Year resolutions that people make only to break it...haha.Glad that i remembered it to put it here.And BTW ur quotes are Swell...like that one u said...One Push is Enough...:)

@Tandarin thanks for reading...but the flowers are not as large as they seem in these zoomed shots but whatever they make lovely fritters.As for me at the moment i am just happy to be able to trace Agst.:)